Tilaa puskuritarra!

Project blog translations, part 7.

At first, a humble apology for the month-and-a-half that has passed between these translations. Some of the information was on Henkka's blog but as the EVS24 in Stavanger is coming up, here are translated snippets from the Finnish project blogs.

April 5th

Lots of people have been visiting the eGarage and "signing in" the project.

Also representatives from different companies have been contacting us about co-operation during the manufacturing of the eCars.

The heater will be implemented with water circulation and it will be connected to the original heating system of eCorolla. Daniel has designed the setup and it has been tested in earlier one-shot conversion, it should be simple and inexpensive.

Simpler gear selector is being designed on the center console (forward and reverse are needed at least) along with the eGUI display.

Most other components are already in store an available for assembly, but the Lithium Balance battery management system is still on the way.

The protocol for eGUI and eECU communication was defined and tested with a separate demo kit, but some work still needs to be done for it to work with the real eECU hardware (Henkka and Tapsa).

Work with eGUI has advanced for "final" screen #1 layouts in SVG format (Joona). Jukka R. has made a version of it that talks with the eGUI engine using javascript. After that's done, Henkka adds them to eGUI engine and there's a working chain from the motor controller to the display (DMOC->eECU->eGUI->SVG->Firefox) - principle.

The eGUI engine has an option to specify parameters and to monitor different devices in "console mode", which is meant to be used only when the car's not moving. It might not even be in the final user interface or very well hidden. It's not really a "unix console" but an ordinary browser application really. Henkka's blog at http://yty.vox.com has more information.

April 16th

The Tuesday after Easter saw a dozen of activists/team leaders gathering to the eGarage, called there by Janne, the project manager, to clarify the vision shared between different teams.

Open things:
- import taxes must be taken care of before registration
- electric motor aligment and attachment to the motor/battery frame
— must have 10 mm insulation
— the motor/battery frame has to come straight up and out from eCorolla engine compartment
- "Racing vacuum pump" was selected to the first car
- DC/DC converter is at hand
- A tractor water heater is one of the heater possibilities
- still waiting for Lithium Balance's shipment
- gas pedal (watt pedal actually) position reading ok, motor controller commands in place but not tested yet
— security checks and thoughts must be added to the software
— original potentiometer (about 1-3.4 kOhm) from gas pedal linkage will be used
- drive direction selector still to be decided, a Valtra rotating switch perhaps?
- interior team comments needed for above
- Megatech from Nummela could help with electric wire set
- chargers need to be ordered

There's now a team called "Inteam" and they work with the cabin interior.

The electric innards of eCorolla (battery frame, motor support ) get a green paint finish and the paint cans were 50% off when good people of RTV Riihimäki heard where they will be used. :-)

More people drop by to see the eGarage action IRL (in real ife) instead of hanging around the website or mailing list.

April 27th

Lots of media has been visiting the eGarage even though the car doesn't even move yet: Aamulehti, Image, Energia magazine and Keskisuomalainen among the others. It's good to have visibility, that way the information about electric cars will keep spreading and it introduces the project to people who might be interested. It takes a toll also: the interviews and photo/video shoots take time, not to mention cleaning up the place… in the future there should be a day/time slot for media attention and the rest of time are reserved to the project.

There's another Corolla project called äCorolla, by "Äpy team" (http://kauppa.apy.fi/info), it has a Siemens motor, 100 Lithium batteries, top speed around 120-170 km/h and range of 100-150 km. The äCorolla was on display in Kamppi, Helsinki in April 29th.

Still waiting for BMS.

May 4th

After a long day for Kari A. and Eki (the eGarage owner) the motor support and electric motor are in their correct places with a little grinding involved. Now a good welder is needed A-SAP (One came up and did the job overnight. Impressive!)

More activists are needed to get the car on the road, preferably during May. Now there are too few builders compared to the publication and completion calendars.

The Lithium Balance BMS arrived around April 28th or 29th. One team could get involved with the BMS if there are willing activists.

May 11th

The car, eCorolla, is ready for display in Electric Vehicle Symposium in Stavanger ( http://www.evs24.org/ ).

Motor and battery frames are painted, motor is in it's place and cabin interior is clean and tidy. Only batteries and BMS are missing from a full display setup.

The car is displayed exactly as it is and the community goes to present themselves openly and honestly: this is what we do, this is where we are now. Most important thing is to communicate the project idea as a teaser: this will be available soon and there's even more.

The community-driven industrial volume conversion is something new even on global scale and open source is coming to (electric) car circles.